I am sure many here have had children who delved into very mature subject matters during conversation. No, I am not talking about the birds and bees, but rather what happens to them when they get old and die. I have be caught off guard with some of these topics, and am trying to figure out the balance between being honest and up front, and not scaring a child with too much information about our eventual end. DD is almost 3.

ohhhh, I just smiled because this is just the beginning! At least once a day I have to remind my DS10 that I am the mom and if I need advice I'll ask for it, but until then just let me be the leader. He has always asked about death, and I just answer in the most appropriate factual way I can. My DS can google it if he wants so I'm glad he comes and talks to me about it! Gifted kids seem to want to know about death and while it may seem inappropriate, I think it's just their insane curiosity!

DS1 understood death (as in a final separation) before he was three, and it led to months of devastating meltdown hades. I only twigged too late that his grandparents had been taking him to the cemetery of fine days, talking care of family graves, and it never occurred to them that their grandson would spend evenings screaming in fear of dying and being buried, and being separated from us. I asked for advice on the mothering gifted forum, but none of it (be factual, be truthful, talk about the circle of life, or conversely, talk about heaven, talk about God, about the undying soul...) worked for him, he was simply having none of it. Didn't want to die, didn't want to be buried, did not want his soul to go to heaven ("how would that work if I am underground? I won't even be able to SEE!"). He insisted that he wanted to live in a house with both of us for ever and ever, and the only thing that somewhat worked was my reassuring him that I'd take care of it. Talk about lying to your kid with the best intentions!
The best advice I ever got was from ultramarina IIRRC,who said that she did not only firmly deny that any of their family was in danger of dying (on the grounds that if anyone did, they'd have bigger problems than whether that was a lie) but also simply forbade her kid to even worry about death, as that was an adult responsibility and not her child's concern.
Oddly, this worked for us.

Thank you Tigerle! I think she fully knows that people do in fact die at some point, and she does have fear of it for herself and her loved ones. She picks up on information from everywhere, even other peoples conversations at a diner, and assembles it well, so I do not believe she will buy any untrue explanation. She defines the human information sponge. I no longer try to figure out how she knows anything that she knows.

She does understand that some things are only adult jobs like driving a car, I could go the route of just letting her know that that is mom and dad's responsibility not hers to worry about. I have already given her my personal comfort that it is more important to think about the fact that we are currently alive.

I think this sort of thing varies tremendously with the individual child.

My DD was fine with (and insisted on answers about) pretty heavy-duty topics at a very young age. Death, war, poverty, genocide, rape, intellectual disability, hidden/non-hidden disabling conditions, and mental illness were all conversations that I know I had with her in all kinds of settings over a period of many years, and starting when she was two or three. We'd covered all of that by the time that she was 8 or 9.

I certainly HOPE that nobody eavesdropping was thinking that I should not have those conversations with my daughter, or that they were things that shouldn't be discussed in public. We don't differentiate academic topics of discussion that way in our family. Private, personal topics, sure-- there is a sense of needing privacy.

But I don't spend time worrying over my DD overhearing someone else discuss something I don't want her thinking about. I can't imagine having a child that I'd need to worry about that. It must be very hard to shelter a sensitive soul like that from just casual inputs in public. I hadn't thought about it before now.

Yup. Somebody mentioning death. Of anyone. Once it was Napoleon, believe it or not. Every mention could set off that train of thought leading to a screaming, inconsolable meltdowns bout the horrible power of death. It made the first half of his third year very stressful. And I did have to forbid his grandparents to take him to the cemetery for a year or so.

DS3 went through a period of some contemplation of death around 2 after reading a poem featuring the line, "Alligator pie, alligator pie, if I don't get some I think I'm going to die." He somehow inferred the universality and inevitability of death and seemed okay with it after some discussion. Imagine these topics stated over the course of a few weeks, introduced one at a time.

My side of the conversation involved these talking points (which have a heavily Catholic underpinning):
- Death as a milestone in a longer existence
- The idea of life as preparation for a heavenly the afterlife
- Introducing the concept of timeless solidarity with the deceased through the communion of the saints, so that loved ones who have passed away aren't seen as inaccessible, and so that we don't leave people behind alone (tied into the Ascension and Jesus' promise to be with us always)
- Linking post-death destination to behaviour within DS' locus of control
- Discussing the idea of a fulfilled life
- Discussing what it means to love infinitely, and the connection between parental love and God's love
- Life expectancy and the probability of death at various ages. I told DS that I wouldn't die until he was an old man, which is likely. 3 of my grandparents have lived past 90, and we have many great aunts and uncles who lived into their late 90s on my side of the family. I have 100 to break!
- I sneakily linked life expectancy to controllable behaviours, like diet, exercise, and sleep to create an incentive for good decisions in those areas.

You know, I HAVE been tempted to exploit DS' fear of death by cancer in order to enforce broccoli.
I've decided not to go there, for various reasons. I just make him eat it.

Thank everyone for all of the responses. I do realize the title of the post is a poor choice of words. I had a broader idea at first, but as I started writing I realized I really wanted to hear peoples ideas on this one topic rather than everything she is doing and saying right now. I changed the title of the post to make it more in line with body of the post.

HowlerKarma, I am right with you on that. We do not shelter our conversation very much at all. Particularly not at the academic level of topics. Academically, she understands many very adult worldly topics. My post about her picking things up at diners was more to state there is no way that I could shelter her if I wanted to. From since she was very young I have very often been unable to figure out how she learned things that she knows, and now I no longer try. She just has a wealth of knowledge that she has some how picked up along the way from what often must have been very incidental methods.

Our DD is another in the 'no sheltering' boat. We figured early on that she seemed to just know a ton of stuff she shouldn't and that the best bet was to just be upfront. I remember reassuring her (this would have been before her third birthday) that while yes, all living things die, humans tend to last a really long time and none of us were planning on dying any time soon. But she wasn't hugely upset, more mildly concerned. When she was 7, she chose to be in the room when we had our dog euthanized and it was a very positive experience for the whole family in terms of dealing with sorrow and mourning at losing our good friend.

She's sensitive about so many other things (perfectionism, criticism, change, finding meaning) that I'm glad she's not also sensitive to these other adult topics.

I was going to log on today to ask a similar question. Our daughter, age 5, is suddenly quite worried about death. She understands death at this point. She is quite concerned that I will pass in the night. She will creep into our room in the middle of the night to check on me. She is very quiet, I only know it because I am a light sleeper. Each night before bed she asks about death and when we will die and how old we will be. We try to be both reassuring but honest. Interestingly, I can recall being afraid of my parents dying in the night when I was young. I used to wake them up to see if they were alive so perhaps this is an improvement?

And the broccoli comment cracked me up

My first conversation with DD on this issue was about how I'm going to turn into a pile of ash and bones upon my death. I can't recall her exact age but I believe she was around 3 and a half?

I was not prepared to discuss it.

Now that she's 4, she seems to have gotten very pragmatic about it. She is planning on learning to drive as soon as possible so she can get to places after my death. She has accepted that everyone dies and as she puts it, there is nothing you can do to stop time. She doesn't seem to be all that traumatized by understanding mortality at a young age.

As for arguing and debating endlessly, we tell her that we're reasonable and we're always open to listening to her opinions as long as she is being rational. That doesn't mean that she'll get her way but if she makes a convincing and persuasive argument, then we might change our mind. She's gotten better about dropping things when she has no valid counterpoints.

My DS who is almost 4 has been discussing this since Easter when he was two. He saw a church play and afterward he couldn't stop crying, missed the egg hunt because he had to understand death. It was heartbreaking. I should have known. He was sobbing, saying, "this man named Jesus died and his mommy was so sad!" And the questions began. Most of his family is Christian and so I explain that "some people believe this happens and some people believe this happens". Here's a story you all can get the humor and embarrassment of: in Dec we went to his great grandmother's 90th. We have been telling him that people die around 100 (which used to be a big number to him-our thoughts were to keep his and our death seem really distant but still a reality) so at the party he sees 90th birthday napkins and says, "oh! GG is 90, she will die soon but she still has 10 more years". He talks very, very loudly. Luckily she takes everything in stride.
He even asks if he and his brother die, will we adopt children? Almost takes me breath away. I try to stop what I'm doing and really be present when he's working through these thoughts.

My DS4 has been asking deep questions about death for a year at least. My parents' cats died, then our dog died. He put together that garbage decomposes and if we bury people when they die do they decompose? This freaks him out to no end.
Anyway, do typical kids not understand death as permanent at 3? Is it the depth of questioning that makes our kids' understanding of death atypical or the fact that they can't stop thinking about it? It has led to much debate on his end over if he wants to be a vegetarian, which I believe I read a discussion about here as well.

Funny--I do not remember giving that advice, Tigerle, but I do remember saying those things to my DD, so yes, it must have been me. I'm glad it helped. Both of my children have gone through this phase, btw, but DD was worse with it than DS.

To this day, I still need to sometimes tell DD that something is my job to worry about, not hers. I think sometimes very smart children feel the weight of the world on their shoulders and worry that adults are not really all that competent. Both of my kids are smarter than I am in some ways (I'm smart-- but they have gifts in areas where I am lacking, and are also very "quick" in ways that I am not) and I think DD, in particular, knows this and finds it unsettling and anxiety-inducing. It's something not often talked about, perhaps because adults don't really like to admit it when it's the case.

When our first child (DD10) was 3.5, I remember being upstairs in the house and suddenly hearing this loud crying and wailing coming from downstairs. She had been discussing the 'cycle of life' with DH and her little mind leaped to the conclusion that she would eventually die. DH decided on honesty and confirmed this fact. She was distraught - I don't remember how I calmed her but I did eventually.

She's never mentioned it again, but I always wonder if it feeds into her ongoing anxiety about being sick (she often worries that she is catching the flu, Ebola, or has cancer).

Strangely, this fear has never led her to eat broccoli (or other fruits or vegetables very much), despite our assurances it would make her healthier.

My DS was 3.5 when our cat died. He has not tested as gifted, and in fact is somewhat delayed in social/emotional skills, and though he does not have a clear diagnosis. He clearly had no idea why everyone was sad or what was going on. When we buried her, and my DD (then 7) was bawling her eyes out, he skipped up, looked at her body, said, "Have a nice nap, kitty!" and skipped off. This definitely made it all the tougher on DD, who was distraught and didn't get over it for at least a year.

While I agree that emotional readiness to process these topics varies by child and may be academic to them, it may not be an academic topic to whoever is in listening vicinity in public. When the child has the emotional readiness, sensitivity and maturity on when, where and with whom these topics are appropriate to discuss is another gauge of how much information to share.

Well, DS is 8 so it must have been more than five years ago - in another incarnation on MDC, not this board. Oddly, it was the one thing that did help. And it broke the vicious cycle of DS being unable to even stand the topic, and we could talk a bit about how healthy we were and how old most people are when they die (luckily, longevity runs in the family...).

DS8 was horribly distraught when on of our cats died this fall. He said it reminded him if the mortality of everyone in our family and that realizing how many deaths of loved ones he will have to endure in his life made him not want to live anymore. He also cried when ds2, born with major special needs, needed surgery yet again and I had to take him to the specialist hospital in the big city. Before, it had always been a big adventure for him because he just loved the trains and tube and the science museum - this time he explained he had realized that not just cats can be beyond help and die, so can little brothers.
Again, I lied and told him that while it was emergent surgery, it was all routine and not risky at All and to stop worrying, we and the drs had everything under control, Not true at all, but I am still thinking that 8 year olds do not need to be able to handle all truths.

Dd4, probably gifted, but quite likely not the same LOG as DS8, did not understand the cats death at all (she cried a little being worried about the other cat taking a way all his toys since he wasn't moving any more, and was upset about the disintegration to dust-thing, but when I told her it might take many years, it was enough to comfort her) and while she has a hard time being separated from her little brother and me, she has no understanding whatsoever if what's behind it.

Another idea may be to take a peek at the Grief & Mourning resources on Hoagies Gifted Education Page. There are resources to comfort during loss of loved ones, and also treasured pets.

Parents may also wish to become familiar with existential depression. One resource is this article by James Webb, as found on the SENG website (Supporting Emotional Needs of the Gifted).